My Father’s Garden: Wood by R J Dent

1: Woodpile

Behind the shed was the woodpile.

My father used to put any pieces of wood that ‘might be useful’ (which was every piece of wood he came in to contact with) on the woodpile. At the back, leaning against the shed wall were all sorts of doors: three interior doors, a front door, several kitchen cupboard doors, even a loft hatch cover. There were planks and floorboards at the bottom of the pile; stakes, posts and battens in the middle, and small pieces of dowelling and blocks and off-cuts on the top. There was also a plastic bag half full of wood chips and sawdust.

There had always been a woodpile. I never knew of a time, era or decade when there wasn’t a woodpile.

Very occasionally, my father would take a piece of wood from the woodpile and use it for some project he was working on.

When that happened, whoever noticed the diminished woodpile would notify everyone else.